61
169
-1
2880
30
Briefs: Energy
Servo control systems require accurate control of motion parameters such as acceleration, velocity, and position. This requires a controller that can apply current (torque) to...
Briefs: Motion Control
Soft robots are made from soft materials that react to applied voltage with a wide range of motions. Such soft robots contain tremendous potential for future applications, as they adapt to dynamic environments...
Briefs: Software
Using 3D printers, researchers have created a metamaterial from cubic building blocks that responds to compression forces by a rotation. Usually, this can only be...
Briefs: Motion Control
Linear actuator manufacturers have a history of strong mechanical design expertise, which is the core of any linear actuation; however, giving motion to modern powered equipment goes beyond a...
Briefs: Automotive
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center has developed a solid-state ultracapacitor with a unique combination of high capacitance and battery-like discharge characteristics. The high capacitance in a...
Briefs: Software
Soil Moisture Active-Passive Project Spacecraft Flight Software
The Soil Moisture Active-Passive (SMAP) Project Spacecraft Flight Software controls all aspects of command and data handling (CDH) in the SMAP spacecraft. Required capabilities include uplink and command, telemetry and downlink, vehicle attitude control, science instrument control,...
Briefs: Photonics/Optics
Doctors currently rely on external ultrasound probes, combined with pre-operative imaging scans, to visualize soft tissue and organs during minimally invasive procedures, as the miniature surgical...
Briefs: Materials
Electromagnetic Metamaterial with Wide Angular and Broadband Spectral Absorption
Propagation in a waveguide requires proper termination of signals to prevent reflections from interfering with the desired circuit functionality. Conventional termination designs for a two-dimensional planar waveguide topology provide maximum signal suppression in the...
Briefs: Medical
Smart Artificial Limbs
Traditional leg prosthetics enable amputees to maintain mobility and lead more active lives. Leg prosthetics most commonly fit amputees’ residual limbs via a socket that encloses the limb like a wooden clog. Because the socket exerts pressure on the limb’s soft tissue, pain and chafing, sores and blisters, and infection...
Briefs: Materials
In order to store information in the conventional magnetic memories of electronic devices, the material’s small magnetic domains are oriented “up” or “down” by using externally...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
CAD models have been developed that enable objects to be 3D-printed out of commercially available plastics; these objects can wirelessly communicate with other smart devices, including a...
Briefs: Software
Deterministic Annealing Clustering
This software partitions a dataset into clusters of data using the Deterministic Annealing algorithm, a more sophisticated clustering technique than usually available in scientific and commercial software. The results provided are deterministic, i.e. unique (within the machine precision tolerance), whereas results...
Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control
Engineers have fabricated transparent, gel-based robots that move when water is pumped in and out of them. They are made entirely of hydrogel — a tough, rubbery, nearly...
Briefs: Materials
NASA Langley Research Center has developed fluorinated alkyl ether-containing epoxies designed as an anti-insect coating. The robust and durable coating was developed to...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
A novel tool was developed that allows users to qualify small-diameter bearings before incorporating them into components. The High-Sensitivity, Environmentally Isolated Bearing Tester...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
The foodborne pathogen Escherichia coli O157 causes an estimated 73,000 illnesses and 60 deaths every year in the United States. Better safety tests could help avoid some of the illnesses...
Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control
System Enables Robots to Understand Contextual Commands
Today’s robots can accomplish many repetitive tasks, but their inability to understand the nuances of human language makes them mostly useless for more complicated requests. For example, if a specific tool is placed in a toolbox and a robot is asked to “pick it up,” it would be...
Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Magnesium is 75 percent lighter than steel, 33 percent lighter than aluminum, and is the fourth most common element on Earth behind iron, silicon, and oxygen. But despite its light...
Briefs: Materials
Researchers at NASA have developed new methods to manufacture carbon materials (e.g., nanotubes, graphene) with holes through the graphitic surface of the particles. The...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
Wind turbine designers are working to provide blade designs that allow a turbine connected to the blades or rotor to effectively convert wind into electricity. The blades must also be...
Briefs: Imaging
Currently there is no reliable way to determine, during tumor-removal surgery, whether the excised tissue is completely cancer-free at its margins — the proof that...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
Measurement devices that can withstand the acid rains on Venus, radiation in space, and the heat of car engines are being developed to improve research in these extreme...
Briefs: Materials
Superconducting materials are technologically important because electricity flows through them without resistance. Only low-temperature superconductivity seemed possible before 1986,...
Briefs: Medical
A new chip device called Tissue Nano-transfection (TNT) can generate any cell type of interest for treatment within the patient’s own body. This technology may be used to repair injured tissue...
Briefs: Software
Researchers have developed a method to quickly and accurately identify people and cell lines from their DNA. The software could be used to flag mislabeled or contaminated cell lines in cancer...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
High-voltage wide bandgap (WBG) semiconductor devices like 15-kV silicon carbide (SiC) MOSFETs have attracted attention because of potential applications in high-voltage and high-frequency power converters....
Briefs: Medical
LightCensor Software for Optimized Viewing of Medical Images
Because of improved display quality, the smartphone has been advocated by medical imaging vendors for viewing medical images in specific conditions that require urgency of results, or when full-sized workstation displays are not readily available. As a handheld device, the viewing...
Briefs: Medical
Researchers have created biosensor technology for wearable devices that continuously analyzes sweat or blood for different types of biomarkers such as proteins that...
Briefs: Software
Discontinuous-Galerkin Spectral-Element Solver (Eddy)
Eddy is a fundamental research code for advancing spectral methods for complex geometry. The software is intended to enable researchers to collaborate through a common framework that supports three-dimensional simulations on practical problems. Areas of interest include advanced numerical...
Top Stories
Blog: Manufacturing & Prototyping
2025 Holiday Gift Guide for Engineers: Tech, Tools, and Gadgets
INSIDER: Research Lab
Scientists Create Superconducting Semiconductor Material
Blog: Software
Quiz: Materials
Blog: Aerospace
Tech Briefs Wrapped 2025: Top 10 Technology Stories
Blog: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Webcasts
Upcoming Webinars: AR/AI
The Real Impact of AR and AI in the Industrial Equipment Industry
Upcoming Webinars: Motion Control
Next-Generation Linear and Rotary Stages: When Ultra Precision...
Upcoming Webinars: Energy
Hydrogen Engines Are Heating Up for Heavy Duty
Podcasts: Medical
How Wearables Are Enhancing Smart Drug Delivery
Podcasts: Power
SAE Automotive Podcast: Solid-State Batteries

